Hamilton fumes at pit stop failures

A furious Lewis Hamilton has called for an inquest into his two disastrous pit stops during the Bahrain Grand Prix that lost his crucial time and track position

McLaren's Lewis Hamilton was not happy to lose almost 20 seconds in total during two disastrous pit stops during the Bahrain Grand Prix on Sunday.

Hamilton initially kept his second place off the grid, only to be undone by a general lack of pace in the car at the Bahrain International Circuit - and, critically, the two very slow pit stops with problems over the left-rear wheel nut.

"We need to look into this very seriously. There has to be an investigation because we gave away a lot of points again today, that's how championships are lost" he said. "We have to try and make sure we pick up on the next race because we can't afford to lose points like we did today," he added.

"For the driver sitting in the car, that's always frustrating, because you're just waiting and there's nothing you can do to help," he said.

McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh explained that two different problems hit Hamilton's pit stops, the first being down to the drive pegs and the drive holes not precisely aligning, while the second incident was a cross-threading issue.

However, he ruled out a switch to the more sophisticated approaches to wheels nuts used by the likes of Ferrari and Mercedes, pointing to the disastrous situation with Michael Schumacher in China that saw the former world champion's wheel detach after a pit stop.

"I would say at the moment the right thing to do is get to a fool-proof system that doesn't cause failure before you get more adventurous," he insisted, before going on to defend the performance of the pit stop crew.

"There is an enormous amount of stress on them," pointed out Whitmarsh, revealing to BBC Sport that the team had even decided to change the left rear wheel man during the race. "We changed him for the last stop because he was stressed but it's our job to protect them. Things go wrong and that's life. We need to make sure we pull together.

"Clearly, our performance was disappointing this afternoon," he admitted. "Having said that, both Lewis and Jenson drove very well in extremely challenging conditions.

"Lewis and Jenson are as resilient as they are competitive, so you can be well sure that in Spain they'll both do their utmost to score as many points as possible," added Whitmarsh.

Source: Crash.net

Now the creator of Alonso's fiasco-strategy talks

Dyer who got sacked by Ferrari defends his actions in the season's last race last year.

Dyer worked as Ferrari's strategist in Abu Dhabi GP where Fernando Alonso's pit strategy failed because he came in too early for his pitstop.

Dyer focused on keeping Alonso ahead of Mark Webber but he didn't count on Alonso getting stuck on the track behind Renault's Vitali Petrov. Hence Alonso lost the WDC to Sebastian Vettel.

Dyer returned to the F1-paddock in Monza.

- We are a team and make decisions as a team. In the end the boss is always responsible, Dyer told Spanish Marca-paper.

- We are not stupid, we don't make decisions just for fun. At that moment the decision in question felt right. We believed it would offer best possibilites for the result we wanted, Dyer said.

Dyer sees that it's possible he will be seen on the F1-paddock next season.

- I have got many job offers but I can't sign any contract until only at the end of the year, Dyer said.

Source: MTV3
Courtesy: Nicole

Vettel: Alonso, Ferrari deserved to win

Sebastian Vettel: At the [second] pit stop we had a problem – the car was already back on the floor, but then we had to lift it back up again. By then I had lost the lead and came out in third...

A less than 'optimum' performance prevented Sebastian Vettel from winning the F1 2011 British Grand Prix today - although team orders did help ensure he took second.

Vettel dominated in the early stages and was looking well set to take yet another victory. However a slow second stop – when the rear jack failed – cost him around 11 seconds and when he rejoined he was down in third and stuck behind Lewis Hamilton. Although he eventually got the jump on the McLaren man, by successfully stopping early for the third and final time on lap 36 to get the undercut, by then he had already lost too much ground to Fernando Alonso.

He eventually finished more than 15 seconds adrift of the Ferrari, coming under considerable pressure near the finish from Mark Webber, at least until the Aussie was instructed to 'hold station'.

Despite 'only' finishing second though, Vettel still stretches his lead in the drivers' championship and he will now go to the Nurburgring in two weeks time with an 80-point cushion – the equivalent to more than three race victories.

“I had an excellent start and with hindsight I wouldn't have minded if there had been more rain because I really liked the conditions when we were racing on the intermediate tyres,” Vettel said post-race. “We seemed to be in very good shape and I was pulling away. We probably waited a little bit too long to go onto the dry tyres, but it was right as there was no need for us to take a risk and we were in control.

“At the [second] pit stop we had a problem – the car was already back on the floor, but then we had to lift it back up again. By then I had lost the lead and came out in third. I struggled to pass Lewis, I thought I could go much quicker, but I never really had the chance. Once I was very close, but it didn't work.

“We got him at the [final] pit stop, but by then Fernando was already gone. It was a good result for us [though], but we had some problems and, if you're not at your optimum, then there's always someone there to beat you. Ferrari was very quick all weekend and they deserved the victory today.”

Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner meanwhile defended the decision to enforce team orders, noting that it made 'absolute sense to consolidate a big haul of points'.

“After a very interesting race that initially started very well for us on the intermediate tyres, second and third is still a very strong result at this circuit, considering everything that has gone on this weekend,” Horner stated.

“Unfortunately we had a rear jack failure on Sebastian's second pit stop, which cost him a lot of time in the pits and dropped him behind Fernando. Having said that, Fernando was very fast today, but at least we would have had the track position going into the latter stint. Having run second early on, Mark had an issue at his second pit stop, but he managed to re-pass Hamilton with a brave move into Turn six. In the closing laps and with the two cars going wheel to wheel, from a team point of view it made absolute sense to consolidate a big haul of points today and not risk having both cars in the fence, which nearly happened to Lewis and Felipe [Massa] on the last corner.

“From a team point of view it's been a very strong day – we gained 33 points and both drivers are now first and second in the Drivers' Championship. On the exhaust issue, hopefully we have now achieved clarity on this and can draw a line under it going forward,” Horner concluded.

Source: Crash.net

Kimi challenges the journalists to a pit stop

Source: FerrariTV

Mark Webber pit stops Red Bull Formula 1 car in London

Source: NextgenAutoVideos